August
21, 2006
Copyright Mediaware Infotech Pvt. Ltd. |
Eighteen
month old YouTube.com has just launched paid videos on its home page. With
the option to create special channels (read video clip galleries) for each advertiser
/ brand.
And top music label Warner Brothers Records is the first advertiser
to use YouTube's special "channel" - with a video promotion for Paris Hilton's
new music album.
What's interesting is that Warner Bros' special channel
also hosts ads of other brands - for which ad revenue is reportedly to be shared
between YouTube & Warner Bros. (And particularly interesting is a promo. for competitor
Fox Network's new "Prison Break" TV series which is hosted on Warner Bros' special
channel! )
Collaborative Model
Not that YouTube is new to hosting
ads on its site. But so far, these were the standard display/banner/text ads.
Also, earlier this year YouTube did host what looked like paid promos. for NBC
Network's newly launched TV shows.
But with the Warner Bros. deal, YouTube
is clearly looking to ride on the advertiser's brand equity to attract other advertisers
to YouTube.com. A sort of collaborative model along the lines of (but distinct
from) the "Google Adwords" model.
Two points are worth mentioning. One,
the Google network has taken many years to establish - in comparision, YouTube
has succeeded in building a loyal viewer base in one year. And two, while the
paradigm of "Build Eyeballs, Collect Ads" is not new, the "Online Video Clips"
route for building a large, viewer base is certainly unique.
Welcome to
the world of online video clip culture!
Privacy Woes
Is
it a mistake for search engines like Google, Yahoo, AOL, MSN to save data related
to search queries? One
thing is clear: because of privacy issues, the liabiliy of unauthorized
exposure is enormous. (And the bigger the database, the more the risk.)
A couple of weeks ago, the research team at AOL decided to host data pertaining
to all the search queries of over 650,000 AOL members for the quarter March -
May 2006. The data comprised of every single query. It included all search topics
like names, social security numbers, addresses and other information keyed in
by AOL members. Although AOL tried to "cover up" the identity of members by replacing
with a number, the identity
of each user could be quite easily guessed from the details available
in the queries.
To prove this, a journalist from the New York Times
successfully traced the data of a user (code no 4417749) by going through the
query data published. Search topics for this user included “numb fingers”, “60
single men”, “dog that urinates on everything”, “landscapers in Lilburn, Ga,”
and several people with the last name Arnold. With a little effort, the data trail
easily led
to 62 year-old widow & AOL member Thelma Arnold, who lives in Lilburn, Ga.
Following this incident, AOL has immediately removed the offending data from
its site. (Unfortunately, there are hundreds of downloaded copies being circulated
on the Web.) Its Chief Technology Officer resigned. (There was clearly no malafide
intention on her part as the data was meant to help improve the understanding
of search engine functioning.) And in a damage-repairing exercise, AOL has announced
serious privacy & data access policies for its employees. (Along with I'm sure,
Google, Yahoo & the whole bunch ! )
But the most significant part of
this incident is the reminder that "central server based databases" are inherently
susceptible to exposure. Whether it is with malafide intentions (as in the recent
cases of BPO executives misusing customer data) or a genuine mistake, the aggregation
of huge amounts of "sensitive" data on central servers will always pose a risk.
And the bigger / more sensitive the data, the higher the risk.
Welcome
to the century of data security concerns! |
Mediaware Infotech Pvt. Ltd.
The New Mahalaxmi Silk Mills Premises,
Mathuradas Mills Estate, Opp Kamala City, Senapati Bapat Marg,
Lower Parel
(West), Mumbai 400 013.
Tel: 6660 2634 Fax: 24923765 Email : response@mediawareonline.com
Mediaware Gulf
P.O.Box No. 182620, Dubai Media City, U.A.E.
Tel: +9714 3681655 Fax: +9714 3688058 Email : m-e@mediawareonline.com
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